It is helpful to understand the upgrade process, and therefore, it is recommended that those attempting to do remote upgrades duplicate the remote infrastructure locally, and test thoroughly.

At least you are working locally, but it is unclear from your posts that you have ever run a standard, recommend upgrade, using an upgrade kernel. Understanding what that does, and how that works, will be an asset.

It is not clear you understand either the installation or upgrade processes. Let me level set:

The files that are installed during installation or upgrade are:

kernels: bsd, bsd.mp, bsd.rd

filesets: *.tgz

During an upgrade, the etc*.tgz fileset and the optional xetc*.tgz fileset are not installed. They are installed later, often with sysmerge(8) and even then some manual steps may be needed, as outlined in the upgrade guides for each release.

There are several .iso files available to aid with installations and upgrades. If above your are referring to install48.iso, this is a "...boot and installation CD-ROM image, which contains the base and X sets, so that install or upgrade can be done without network connectivity." This file is designed to be burned to optical media and booted. You will need access to the console, as described above. It is not designed or intended for remote use. It contains the filesets and kernels, on a CD9660 filesysetem. It is not a CD.

You can mount the image file and extract the filesets and kernels, using vnconfig(8) and mount(8) or mount_cd9660(8) per FAQ 14.11. Or you can burn and mount the CD.

Or you can download the individual filesets and kernels, which is what is commonly expected for those who are doing remote installations.

The other .iso files are used for CD image booting as well, but do not contain the filesets or kernels. (Well, they contain a bsd.rd kernel that is booted but that is all.)

At least you are working locally, but it is unclear from your posts that you have ever run a standard, recommend upgrade, using an upgrade kernel. Understanding what that does, and how that works, will be an asset.

I don't claim to understand fully the installation process, but I have gone through it successfully a few times. The upgrade path, I have never walked before. This will be my first time.

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The files that are installed during installation or upgrade are:

kernels: bsd, bsd.mp, bsd.rd

filesets: *.tgz

These items are not defined in the 4.7 to 4.8 page. I appreciate that you listed them.

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During an upgrade, the etc*.tgz fileset and the optional xetc*.tgz fileset are not installed. They are installed later, often with sysmerge(8) and even then some manual steps may be needed, as outlined in the upgrade guides for each release.

This is very clearly outlined.

Quote:

There are several .iso files available to aid with installations and upgrades. If above your are referring to install48.iso, this is a "...boot and installation CD-ROM image, which contains the base and X sets, so that install or upgrade can be done without network connectivity." This file is designed to be burned to optical media and booted. You will need access to the console, as described above. It is not designed or intended for remote use. It contains the filesets and kernels, on a CD9660 filesysetem. It is not a CD.

Understood. But the upgrade ought to produce the same result no matter the road chosen. Yes, I was referring to the install48.iso. My aim was to "emulate" the CD to get the upgrade going.

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You can mount the image file and extract the filesets and kernels, using vnconfig(8) and mount(8) or mount_cd9660(8) per FAQ 14.11. Or you can burn and mount the CD.

I will burn a physical disk first, and then take a closer look at the process.

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Or you can download the individual filesets and kernels, which is what is commonly expected for those who are doing remote installations.

This is what I am trying to accomplish. I'll experiment and report back.

Step 0.1: Conduct an automated upgrade before attempting any manual upgrades. You can then restore, and do things manually. The upgrade without a kernel procedure is entirely manual, and prone to error if you do not have an excellent understanding of every step, in order.

Step 0.2: Before embarking on a manual upgrade, boot a ramdisk kernel and look through the shell scripts that run when you select the upgrade option.

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These items are not defined in the 4.7 to 4.8 page. I appreciate that you listed them.

They are described in detail in the INSTALL.<arch> file in every release directory. They are described in detail in FAQ 4.7. They are mentioned, by name, in the upgrade guide -- but in the shell commands you execute in order to conduct the manual upgrade process.

It is assumed that those doing this understand the process completely.

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But the upgrade ought to produce the same result no matter the road chosen.

Unless you clearly understand what you are doing, you are likely to get lost along the way.

There are a multitude of methods for conducting an installation or upgradewhen you have local control of your system, and access to the console. Booting the ramdisk kernels from optical media, diskette, or network interfaces. The installation/upgrade content can be on the network, optical media, hard disk, or tape. Some architectures limit those choices, of course.

On any system where you can obtain remote access to the system console, you can conduct a remote installation or upgrade. But in general, that is NOT the case with the most popular two architectures: i386 or amd64. (Yes, it is possible to do this with these architectures, with proper planning and with customized configurations. Unsupported, of course.)

The manual process described in the upgrade guide is NOT recommended, but explained, for those who are forced to conduct a remote upgrade/installation without access to the console.

Practice locally, of course. That is one good thing you have elected to do.

Indeed, the upgrade is a bit messy. I had to reinstall 4.7 in order to perform the upgrade to 4.8 a second time. The association to easy and swift that I once got, is now entirely gone. But I have gained some insight and I will keep on practicing.